Keeping the Steam Up?

[teeps]

I've just bought some lovely locomotives from SLW before they disappear. They are beautifully done, but I have trouble keeping the steam up. The cab controls are labelled in Polish, so I don't really know what's what, and I'm not sure if they have any effect beyond the basic injectors, blower, regulator and reverser anyway. Does anyone have any hints that might help me, whether related to these particular engines (e.g. the BR18 201) or in general?

Thanks!

 

[Ghost42]

www.trainzclassics.co.uk/guides_tips/files/Driving_the_9F.pdf
Rog

 

[stovepipe]

I've just bought some lovely locomotives from SLW before they disappear. They are beautifully done, but I have trouble keeping the steam up. The cab controls are labelled in Polish, so I don't really know what's what, and I'm not sure if they have any effect beyond the basic injectors, blower, regulator and reverser anyway. Does anyone have any hints that might help me, whether related to these particular engines (e.g. the BR18 201) or in general?

Thanks!

It is a nice loco, but the extra controls are just for effect. The 9f linked above has a similar number of extra controls. Unfortunately Trainz does not model cylinder cocks or dampers as yet.

The reason you can't keep pressure up is because it has a trainz-build 1.3 engine spec, i.e an ancient one. You will need to change to a later trainz-build 2.8 enginespec and possibly a different cab.

As it happens I just bought this loco too, but haven't yet started my usual fiddling to get it to work properly in Cab mode. I'll post back when I have.

 

[teeps]

Thanks for the replies. It hadn't occurred to me that the enginespec might be causing a problem. If you do manage to work something out I'd love to hear about it.

 

[rweber95]

If you can't wait for a new enginespec and you're feeling brave, you could download Billegulla's great enginespec spreadsheet which you can download using the CM. It's Universal steam e-specs 09,<kuid2:81997:51009:3>. The 9F datum required to generate the parameters for the steam container in the enginespec are:
2 cylinders
pressure 250 psi
bore 20"
stroke 28"
driver dia 60"

Bob Weber

 

[teeps]

Well, I have downloaded the spreadsheet and given it a go, but now I have a locomotive which refuses to move! I used the values from the spreadsheet for the steam container, and then took the rest of the file from the old enginespec. Can anyone see any glaring error in what I have here?

kuid                                    <kuid:549197:100027>
username                                "BR 52 Enginespec"
trainz-build                            3.1
category-region                         "BG;CZ;DE;HU;PL;RO;RU;SU;TR"
category-era                            "1940s"
kind                                    "steam-engine"
category-class                          "ZE"

flowsize
{
  trainbrakepipe                        170000
  epreservoirpipe                       0.1
  no3pipe                               0.1
  no4pipe                               0.1
  auxreservoirvent                      0.1
  auxreservoir_no3                      0.1
  auxreservoir_trainbrakepipe           0.1
  autobrakecylindervent                 0.1
  auxreservoir_autobrakecylinder        0.1
  equaliser_mainreservoir               0.06
  equaliservent                         0.06
  equaliserventhandleoff                0.1
  equaliserventemergency                0.1
  no3pipevent                           1.5
  no3pipe_mainreservoir                 0.1
  compressor                            8
  trainbrakepipe_reservoir              1
  trainbrakepipevent                    0.06
  no3pipe_autobrakecylinder             0.1
  epreservoirpipe_autobrakecylinder     0.1
  mainreservoir_ep                      0.1
  vacuumbrakepipe                       0.1
  vacuumbrakepipereleasevent            0.1
  vacuumbrakepipevent                   0.1
  vacuumbrakereservoir_vacuumbrakepipe  0.1
  vacuumbrakecylinder_vacuumbrakepipe   0.1
  highspeedexhauster_vacuumbrakepipe    0.1
}

volume
{
  scale                                 1
  trainbrakepipe                        0.2
  epreservoirpipe                       0.2
  no3pipe                               0.2
  no4pipe                               0.2
  auxreservoir                          0.1339
  autobrakecylinder                     0.001988
  vacuumbrakepipe                       0
  vacuumbrakereservoir                  0
  vacuumbrakecylinder                   0
  mainreservoir                         0.8
  equaliser                             0.0244
  independantbrakecylinder              0.001988
}

pressure
{
  scale                                 1
  compressor                            0.00970352
  mainreservoir                         0.00930164
  highspeedexhauster                    0
  brakepipe                             0.00613351
  brakeinitial                          0.00562352
  brakefull                             0.00399151
  indbrakefull                          0.00399151
  trainbrakepipe_start                  0.004
  epreservoirpipe_start                 0
  no3pipe_start                         0
  no4pipe_start                         0
  auxreservoir_start                    0.004
  autobrakecylinder_start               0.00160352
  vacuumbrakepipe_start                 0
  vacuumbrakereservoir_start            0
  vacuumbrakecylinder_start             0
  mainreservoir_start                   0.009
  equaliser_start                       0.004
  independantbrakecylinder_start        0.00160352
}

mass
{
  scale                                 1
  fuel                                  32000
}

motor
{
  resistance                            1.3
  adhesion                              2.5
  maxvoltage                            600
  maxspeed                              23.6
  brakeratio                            55000
  max-accel                             2000
  max-decel                             9900
  throttle-notches                      8
  axle-count                            6
  surface-area                          110
  moving-friction-coefficient           0.03
  air-drag-coefficient                  0.0025
}

steam
{
  boiler-volume                         6.33
  burn-rate                             0.552
  burn-rate-idle                        0.00552
  firebox-heating-surface-area          16.26
  firebox-efficiency                    0.8
  max-coal-mass                         654
  ideal-coal-mass                       327
  max-fire-temperature                  761.3
  piston-angular-offsets                0.1,1.6708
  piston-volume-min                     0.00667
  piston-volume-max                     0.14006
  piston-area                           0.28281
  safety-valve-low-pressure             1683
  safety-valve-high-pressure            1716
  water-injector-rate                   2.45
  boiler-efficency-idle                 1
  boiler-efficency                      1
  boiler-efficency-min                  1
  speed                                 10.55
  cutoff                                0.55
  blower-effect                         0.1
  blower-max-flow                       0.055
  steam-chest-volume                    0.2749
  steam-chest-max-flow                  69.43
  valve-lap-percent                     0.1
  hand-brake-max-force                  1000
  super-heating-constant                100
  number-cylinders                      2
  number-power-strokes                  2
  min-fire-temperature                  560.2
  initial-boiler-temperature            472
  shovel-coal-mass                      13.1
  safety-valve-low-flow                 1.48
  safety-valve-high-flow                4.45
  starting-water                        6000
}

 

[Ghost42]

Glancing at your spec there appears to be huge differencies between this and the 9F enginspec eg piston-vol-max 144 and 0.14.
May be worth comparing the specs.
But I will make way to those with more knowledge (as usual)
Rog
ps This is the Double-Chimney version

 

[RPearson]

The piston volume min and max - which is a bit misnamed by the programmers as it is actually cylinder volume - is volume in litres in the old specs but in the new is volume in m3. So a factor of 1000 difference in input values for same cylinder volume. I don't remember which way TC3 was set up as I don't have it installed to check out but the 9f espec should be set up for it and it's possible it might be different. It was a transition between the old set up and the new.

I've checked Bill's spreadsheet and it calculates the values based on correct input units for the especs. Bill adjusts the values to get - in his judgement - a better correlation to the loco's power output. So the volumes in the spreadsheet won't match exactly the volumes calculated from the cylinder geometry.

Boiler volume was also changed from litres to m3. But interestingly the minimum and maximum volumes which specify water volume in the boiler at min and max sight gauge levels remained in litres as is the new fusiable plug volume.

So much for trying to eliminate confusion in units for input values. But that's what we have.

Bob Pearson

 

[teeps]

Interesting, I'll look at the units in the original spec again to correlate. However, I reverted to SLW's enginespec and spent a bit of time experimenting with the controls in the cab. Whether it's scripting wizardry from Martiin or just I got things right this time I did get a good head of steam going this time!

 

[RPearson]

Well the game makes up a spec based on the contents of the old one and uses defaults for missing new tags (well maybe - nobody really knows what it does). Sometimes it works but usually it isn't that good - IMHO. Bill's spreadsheet should give better results.

I prefer to use my own spreadsheet which is based more on 1st principles. It also requires a bit more input. Bill's uses regression formulas to calculate params based mainly on the HP that he calcs for the loco. The formulas are based on the especs he made for a number of locos that were developed thru a lot of testing in the game. You can adjust the HP calc by changing the R factor input he provides to match a known IHP for the loco or a corrected drawbar HP. And if you don't well most users don't seem too concerned or even notice that they aren't getting a good simulation of the real loco's performance.

I tried Bob's numbers for the loco in Bill's spreadsheet and got similar numbers to what you posted. Not exactly a match but I don't know what you used.

One thing I saw was you didn't include a "firebox-thermal-conductivity" tag. Bill's spreadsheet is based on a value of 17 for this tag. Without it you get the game's default which is 10. This tag sets the heat transfer rate thru the firebox walls. It has a big effect on evaporation rate (steam production) in the boiler. I don't know if that would keep it from moving but it would reduce steaming capability quite a bit.

Another is the starting water tag. Bill doesn't include one and gets the game default - 85% of boiler capacity. You set it to 6000. If this is kgs as the wiki indicates then it pobably doesn't leave any room for steam in the boiler. This mass of water at the initial boiler temp and pressure specified will occupy more than the 6000 ltrs that it occupies at room temp and pressure. (Going from 60 deg F and atmospheric pressure to 406 deg F and 250 psig the vol increases to just about 7000 ltrs.) Total boiler vol specified is only 6330 ltrs. If it is ltrs then you're at 95% of boiler cap and over the sight glass limits.

Probably best to just take the default unless you are willing to calculate a realisitic value. I always calculate that and also a starting-boiler-steam (mass of steam in boiler) so that I don't get any surprizes like very high boiler pressure and blow-off to start or a drastic drop in boiler pressure when the throttle is 1st opened.

Finally I'd change the trainz-build to something like 2.8 or 2.9.

Bob Pearson

PS - Here's what I would have used with a boiler vol of 6.33m3 and 250psig for rated pressure. Temp setting used should give about 240 psig to start - Bill's number will be closer to 220 psig (that's just personal preference on how close to rated you want to start out):

boiler-volume                  6.330
minimum-volume                 5064
maximum-volume                 5697
fusible-plug-volume            4748
starting-water                 5507
initial-boiler-temperature     476.2
starting-boiler-steam          7.276

 

[rweber95]

A Christmas Wish to N3V

"...(well maybe - nobody really knows what it does)."
This is the understatement of the year for this simulator. As an old-time (79 in Dec) ex-programmer, I am gobsmacked by the response of Auran/N3V when it comes to the enginespec kuid. They provide a mechanism for us to implement customized performance for a locomotive and yet, don't provide us the specification for it's mechanization.

They must have published, if only for internal use, the equations that define the physical system used to simulate steam and diesel locomotive performance but have steadfastly stonewall us on providing this information to us (their customers). How can you program a function without a spec??? How can you validate/verify the software without a spec????

All we need is an honest definition of each parameter and it's scaling and we could all be happier.

Come on N3V and gives us a Christmas present and reveal the secrets of the enginespec. I don't think it will compromise Australian National Security .

Bob Weber

 

[RHKluckhohn]

The reason you can't keep pressure up is because it has a trainz-build 1.3 engine spec, i.e an ancient one. You will need to change to a later trainz-build 2.8 enginespec and possibly a different cab.

My installs of both TRZ2006 and 2009 (Build 41844 in the latter) are both plagued with disappearing boiler pressure. Someone noted that the blower sucks steam when in use (of course it uses some). The problem has been noted with all the steam engines that come with those versions of TRZ -- C-41, the Mallards, and all. So your answer above seems to indicate that one can download enginespec 2.8 -- is that from the download station or elsewhere - and edit the locomotive specs to point to it? Do I have that right?

Lost in Trainz,
Bob

 

[2995Valliant]

There's a number of steam specs on the DLS by Paul Hobbs (kuid:44090) using Bill Fock's spreadsheet for their origin, and a lesser number by myself using (bar one) real world values.

Once you've downloaded a suitable spec, you can edit the loco config file to change the kuid of the enginespec used.

hth,

Anthony

 

[RHKluckhohn]

Thank you for your help!

:B~)

There's a number of steam specs on the DLS by Paul Hobbs (kuid:44090) using Bill Fock's spreadsheet for their origin, and a lesser number by myself using (bar one) real world values.

Once you've downloaded a suitable spec, you can edit the loco config file to change the kuid of the enginespec used.

hth,

Anthony